With a 'begging your pardon, miss,' to a stoically resigned Elstow, he went on, 'I take the mum and dad back to Paphos for a month, and when I gets back, the office is in a right state of choss. A right boss-eyed state of choss.'

We have been in a state of choss for some time, and the smell of newly painted woodwork was so bad that it gave both of us colds and bronchial coughs and sent us to the Biltmore for a week until the house had dried out.